Introducing the Leff Strategy Studio

Companies of all stripes have changed how they approach content marketing. Executives now recognize the importance of being part of the conversation across many channels. And they know that content can support multiple strategic goals, including brand building, business development, customer engagement, investor relations, and internal communications.

Creating content for all of these audiences and channels represents a huge investment of money and organizational resources, and that spending continues to rise. Recent research found that 50 percent of B2B companies expected to increase their investments in content creation in 2019.

Yet many companies are not getting the expected ROI from their content efforts. One of the biggest reasons: a majority of companies fail to understand the competitive landscape and how they can differentiate themselves before hurtling forward. The harsh truth is that if you’re not providing something new and distinctive, you’re just background noise—and you’re likely wasting your audience’s time.

We’re proud to announce the launch of Leff Strategy Studio—a set of services designed to help companies hone their content strategy.

Leff Strategy Studio: Competitive audits

The competitive audits service line covers four areas.


The Gold Standard evaluates thought leadership by top professional services firms, assessing each piece on four metrics—provocativeness and timeliness, analytical rigor, depth of prescription, and overall readability—to identify the most credible voices. This level of analysis offers an accurate, objective view of the current trendsetters in thought leadership.


Our Competitive Analysis uncovers common themes and details competitors’ share of voice. This detailed look at the marketplace of ideas on a given topic or industry highlights not just how much firms are publishing, and on what topics, but also the impact of their efforts.


Our Message Matrix clearly spotlights white space and potential angles that companies can own. At a time when the volume of publishing continues to rise, finding new approaches to topics is the difference between having a distinctive voice and just contributing to the background noise.


Our Content Planning and Prescriptions enables firms to lay out a clear, actionable path to ensure their content rises to the top. From messaging platforms to extended integrated content campaigns across multiple channels, we can help reach and engage the target audience.

How we got here, and why it matters

This offering is the product of firsthand work with clients as well as much internal thought and discussion about the best way to help companies do better. Readers of this blog will recognize the bread crumbs along this path: from musings on what good thought leadership looks like and regular updates on standout thought leadership (courtesy of the monthly Gold Standard) to discussions of how to identify white space.

We’re well aware that we aren’t the first ones to offer thought leadership diagnostics and evaluations. Here’s how we’re different: unlike other companies, our analysis is performed by seasoned editors and content strategists with decades of experience in producing thought leadership and high-quality content at professional services firms and agencies. We understand how important these insights are, and we take our analysis seriously.

Our reports offer an unmatched level of analysis and recommendations that you can immediately apply to your operations.

Thought leadership requires a huge investment in experts’ time and organizational resources—especially when the cost of a typical white paper or video can run into five figures and take months to produce. Clarity on the landscape can increase the odds that your thought leadership achieves your goals and resonates with your target audience.

We’re ready to help you improve the quality of your content and ensure that it supports your business goals, from client development to reputation building.

When the game changes, you have to raise yours. Let the Leff Strategy Studio help.

Scott Leff

Scott is the founder of LEFF. He’s spent his career helping executives and subject matter experts tell their story in a compelling way. In the process, he’s had the opportunity to work with C-suite executives, politicians, academics, and Olympians, not to mention dozens of talented writers, editors, and designers in the business world. Scott developed the concept of “lean content creation” as a cost-effective way to support comprehensive, integrated communication strategies.

Leave a Reply